This is both a specific study of conversion in a corner of the Spanish Empire, and a work with implications for the understanding of European domination and native resistance throughout the colonial world. Dr Clendinnen explores the intensifying conflict between competing and increasingly divergent Spanish visions of Yucatan and its destructive outcomes. She seeks to penetrate the ways of thinking and feeling of the Mayan Indians in a detailed reconstruction of their assessment of the intruders.

A study of Mayan conversion in sixteenth-century Yucatan.
Reviews
'Ambivalent Conquests sets a high standard of elegance in style and argument.' Nancy Farriss, Hispanic American Historical Review
'This is a splendid book by a gifted historian.' Steve J. Stern, The American Historical Review
'This is an intricate story, by turns exhilarating and depressing, of cultural interaction among parties whose motives were consciously and unconsciously at variance. . . . Clendinnen's reconstruction is a model of historical intelligence and anthropological empathy couched in superbly crafted prose." Frederick P. Bowser, Latin American Research Review
'[Clendinnen's] analysis of the symbolic forms of everyday life sheds new light on the relationship between the 'social' and the 'sacred'.' Journal of the History of the Behavioral Sciences
'A worthwhile contribution.' Matthew Restall, UCLA Historical Journal



Book Information
ISBN 9780521820318
Author Inga Clendinnen
Format Hardback
Page Count 264
Imprint Cambridge University Press
Publisher Cambridge University Press
Weight(grams) 438g
Dimensions(mm) 221mm * 147mm * 22mm